


Kisses and Scars like a Breadcrumb Trail

by bloodandcream



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Scars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-01
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-01-14 04:01:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1251979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodandcream/pseuds/bloodandcream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of snapshots following the development of the relationship between Sam and Dean from wee little to current, bits are from either one of their perspectives or both. Focuses around the contrast of sweet moments with painful ones, mostly in a lineal progression.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Butterflies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kisses and scars  
>  like a breadcrumb trail  
>  through the woods of our lives  
>  Will it lead us back home  
>  through thick copses of trees  
>  and twisting paths too dark to see  
>  through bramble briars where  
>  the path is overgrown and forgotten  
>  These old scars ache  
>  in the dark parts of the woods  
>  don't stray from the path  
>  it's easy to get lost there  
>  But you will find clearings too  
>  along the breadcrumb trail  
>  where the trees part to fields green  
>  scattered with multitudes of wild flowers  
>  and everything was so bright and warm  
>  in those parts of the woods  
>  Where kisses flitted like butterfly wings  
>  beautiful and so easy to break  
>  Follow the breadcrumb trail  
>  Back back back to where we began  
>  Two paths that merged  
>  We've been stumbling through these woods  
>  for a time that seems forever  
>  Littering the paths  
>  With our kisses and our scars

Part One: Butterflies

-

 

Dean is only eight years old and he has few memories of his mother to hold on to. Through the various other kids he's talked to from school to school, through tv and media, and at least a little through books, his young mind had started to mesh interpretations of what a mother should be with what he was able to recall of her. His memories are never very clear, only a few circumstances remain stark and certain like her feeding him a sandwich at the kitchen table or her reading him his favorite book before bed. But mostly, his memories are feelings, a recollection of warmth and safety as she held him against her chest that's mostly absent in his life anymore. He might not have the comforts of his mother anymore, but he has his little brother.

Daddy told him to take care of Sam, to protect him, to watch out for him. Sometimes Dean thinks he can be good to Sam like Mommy was to him, since Sam never even got to have the memories Dean does. He is still so young, but he wants to keep his brother safe, to love him with everything he is. So Dean tries to be something to his brother that he doesn't understand, that he can't grasp yet at so young. But he tries.

Sometimes at night when Daddy's already asleep and Sammy is having a bad dream or a tummy ache keeps him up, Dean will tuck the often scratchy and constantly changing bed sheets around his young shoulders and give him a kiss goodnight, humming something quietly to his brother and holding him close while they both fall asleep.

Daddy tries to take good care of them, Dean knows, he trusts and he loves his father completely. His father is an important man, and if he has to stay up late reading important things or if he passes out early from a long important day or if his hands are wrapped in bandages and Dean has to put what food together he can - he's good at pb&j and can even make a box of mac and cheese - then that's ok. Because he remembers how Mommy used to do it, used to be things that Daddy isn't, and he wants Sammy to have those things too.

-

Sam is only seven years old but he's already wrestling with his big brother, in the woods behind the run down apartment complex. Dean's much better at it, like he's better at pretty much everything. But Sam doesn't mind because Dean's going to teach him, he'll teach him how to be tough. They tussle and roll around in the grass under shady trees, hot in a Midwestern summer, Dean showing him how to pin, how to throw a punch, how to kick at someone's knees from behind. Of course, watching an eleven year old and a seven year try to imitate something grown up's do, fists still small and chubby, Sam's thin arms too short compared to his brother, they would never really hurt anyone like that but they're determined children with no better way to pass the time.

It would just be children playing, but Dean is already very serious, he's seen his father come home bloody more than a few nights, and even though Dad is still fairly secretive he tells Dean things, scary things, but Dean knows it's better to be told so he can be prepared. And he'll make sure Sam is too, even is Sam is too young to know why, even if Dean doesn't really know it either himself.

Dean knows they weren't supposed to leave the apartment, but they're still on the grounds of the property, it's within sight, so he figures it should be fine; besides Dad wasn't going to be gone long, and they didn't really have enough room in the cramped apartment for him to wrestle with Sam. Although, Sam just kind of pouts at him and runs around. Dean tackles his brother, both of them squealing and laughing, it's still a game to them. Then Sam tenses underneath him before flailing and screaming, tears easy to fall down his round apple cheeks, Dean pulling him up and frowning, he didn't think he was being too rough.

But Sam's knee is bloody and Dean sees the glint of an aluminum can lid in the grass and Sam must of cut himself on that.

"Hey, Sammy, it's ok, let's go inside and I'll patch you up ok?" 

"De-de-deeee it huuuuurts." 

Dean manages to calm Sam down enough to a few little sniffles while they go back inside. Setting him on a kitchen chair and fetching the emergency kit where Dad showed him it was, he fished out a band aid and a bottle of some kind of thing that was supposed to clean stuff before you put the band aid on. When he wet a towel with it and put in on Sam's knee though, it didn't seem to help it just made his brother wail even louder.

"Hey Sammy, shhh, be quiet, it's just a small cut, you don't want Dad to come home and see you being a wussy do you?"

Sam's face is streaked with snot and tears, scrunched up, lip trembling, but he shuts his mouth and shakes his head side to side. "But it hurts."

Dean tries to remember what his Mommy would do, because she always made things better. Wiping a smudge of red off Sam's knee and putting the band aid on, he bent forward and pressed a kiss to it. "There, I kissed it so it'll be better. Cause kisses are magic." 

It’s some sort of girly thing boys aren’t supposed to believe in, Dean knows that, but Sam swallows thickly and looks down at his big brother and his patched up knee and his face loosens with an attempted smile, so that’s good enough for Dean. 

Sam does feels better. He doesn't think it's the kiss though, he just thinks Dean is magic.

-

Sam is only ten but he’s old enough to watch after himself for just a few hours. Dad had to take Dean on an important hunt, cause Dean was getting old enough that he needed to get out and get field experience not just sit around and research, but Sam is still too young to go out. It was okay though, he liked doing the research anyway, he wished a little that he could go out with them just so he could watch out for Dean. Even though Dean was always the one looking after him, sometimes Sam really wished he could make his brother feel better, he knew how sad Dean got sometimes and it wasn’t supposed to be like that. 

So Sam was good and he stayed put in the motel reading and doing his homework and watching tv. The tv was old and fuzzy though. And he was hungry but there wasn’t anything except crackers left. Sam fiddled with his clothes, fiddled with his books, fiddled with the weapons he was learning how to clean properly, he just fiddled because he was nervous and too young and his brother was out on a dangerous hunt. Sam knew what hunts meant, he was young but all his life he had seen his dad coming home, seen him hurt, seen Dean patch him up. Sam didn’t want that for his brother.

They came back pretty late and Sam was pretending to be asleep, because it really was past his bedtime and it’s not like there was anything interesting to do, but he couldn’t actually sleep thinking about his big brother out there with, what was it again, a ghost they were talking like. Salt and burn. Why did they want to cook ghosts? They couldn’t taste very good. But they were back eventually and Sam stayed under the covers until he could hear his dad’s heavy snoring in the bed next to them. Both he and Dean were still sharing a bed, small enough for it even though his brother was getting so big; Sam felt like he’d never catch up. 

There had been some mumbled talking and the clink of weapons but once he heard Dad snoring, Sam was up and sneaking towards the crease of light at the bathroom door. It didn’t sound like Dean was in the shower so he snuck in, the door unlocked, and there was Dean without his shirt on standing on his tip toes to look at a big patch of deep purple bruises up his side. Sam’s eyes went wide and he gasped, clasping a hand over his mouth when his brother spun around and glared at him. But Dean didn’t push him away, instead he pulled Sam in and closed the door behind him. Sam was right, Dean was out there getting himself hurt, it wasn’t fair to his brother.

“Sammy, what’re you doin still up?”

“De, are you okay?”

Sam reached out with small fingers, worried, all the times Dean made him feel better, feel warm under his ribs, he wanted to make his brother feel better too cause now he was the one who was hurt. 

“S’fine, me and dad killed that ghost together, we dug up the grave Sam, and then the sucker showed up all angry and it was like whooosh and I was like ‘dad watch out’ and then it came for me, and he threw me against a tree but Dad lit the monsters bones on fire and it just phwesh disappeared. It was so cool.”

Dean’s enthusiasm was only tempered when Sam touched a wide bruise on his side, a little ‘ow’ escaped but he frowned and swatted at Sam’s hand.

“I don’t like these.” Sam looked up at his big brother, wavering with a thought to lean forward a little more.

“It’s not that bad.”

“Here, I’ll make it better.”

Sam ducked forward and pressed a kiss to Dean’s ribs, cause kisses always made things better, and Sam felt better too because he got to help his brother, leaning back with a bright smile on his face and it matched the one on Dean’s lips, warm and happy.

“C’mere squirt.”

Dean pulled Sam into a hug and kissed the rumpled hair on his head. He was damn proud of his first successful like for real out in the field hunt with dad, but his side throbbed and his breath was painful; it really did feel just a little better though to have his brother with him. 

-

There are many more nights that Sam stays up until his eyes burn and he can’t read the numbers on the alarm clock anymore, waiting for his dad and his brother to come home, falling asleep when the worry that sours his stomach isn’t enough to keep his eyes open. It’s a school night and he should be sleeping, but so should Dean. No, this hunt is too important, Dad needs back up, there aren’t other hunters around, the werewolf’s already gotten four people. And Dean was only too happy to go, Sam could see it, although his face was perfectly serious while Dad was talking to him about it, he stood there with his feet slightly apart, hands clasped behind his back, chin raised, face still as he nodded, but Sam saw it in his eyes, how much his brother liked going hunting. Sam didn’t like it. 

He didn’t like seeing bruises and cuts on his brother. Of course, his Dad got a lot those too, but since Sam could remember there was always something distant and wrong about Dad. Dean though, he remembered when his brother didn’t have marks all over his body from a hunt. Even when they had some down time there were scars already, Sam felt like his brother was too young to have scars like that, like the puckered burn against the back of a shoulder or a silver gash down his side. Sam didn’t want that for Dean and it only hurt more because he could remember when it was different.

Of course, Sam was just coming into puberty at thirteen and his body was regularly flooded with feelings of anger and hopelessness, and most of it was directed at his father, there wasn’t many other constants in his life and he refused to sling any of it Dean’s way. He was too young to question their lives deeply, but mature enough to really analyze and pick apart the new things that swirled in his body that was growing taller every day. 

He had managed to fall asleep this night, but it barely felt like his eyelids had closed when the door to their small studio apartment opened with a clatter. Up and aware in under a second Sam scrambled from the cramped room he shared with Dean into the single communal space that served as kitchen, living room and dining room to see his brother limping with a grimace on his face and blood running down a leg, one arm slung over his Dad’s shoulder, still trying to twist his lips up in a cocky grin. Dad didn’t look too happy and Sam could tell how harried he was by the jerkiness of his movements. Sam moved quickly to close the door behind them and fetch the emergency kit under the kitchen sink. Everything passed in quick strobe shots, tearing open supplies, his brother pantless on a wood chair and his thigh ripped open in several parallel gashes deep enough to see a glisten of fat through the blood that wouldn’t stop spurting, Sam stood wide eyed and passed everything to his father, holding his hands over his brother’s wounds to keep it pressed together, fetching water, scurrying around replying on automatic every time his father gave him a command. 

Sam finally blinked, he was sitting on his bed, coming back down from the adrenaline rush with hands scrubbed red raw, oh yeah he had gotten a lot of blood on them, his hair hung limply with the sweat that soaked it, his ramrod posture that had been maybe the only thing keeping him up suddenly slumped forward, exhausted. Dad nudged the door to their room open and somehow Dean was still limping next to him as he was deposited on the bed. Dad pulled the blankets up around him, patting him three times on a shoulder with a mumbled, “You did a good job son.” before he turned and gave Sam a pat on the head with a nod and a faint smile, walking out the door and rustling around in the kitchen. Sam could hear the clink of bottles.

Dean grunted and rolled over, pulling the blanket away from his thigh. Sam could barely see him in the crack of light from the door that was parted a few inches. His head lolled over, whites of his teeth showing in what might be a grimace or a grin when he said, “Hey, Sammy....”

Sam knew there was more to that statement but he doubted Dean even had it in him to talk much at that point. He got up and crossed the few feet to his brother’s bedside, sitting on the edge for a second before pulling his legs up and squirming next to Dean, being mindful of his leg. 

“You going to be ok?”

“S’no biggie.”

Sam bit his lower lip, one hand reaching out to settle on Dean’s stomach. It had been years since they were small enough to sleep in the same bed, years since Dean had treated him like a kid making sandwiches for him and kissing his bruises and teaching him all sorts of things like a cool big brother. Sam felt like Dean was just getting to other end of what he had been hovering on himself, and he didn’t like that gulf. He wanted things to be like they were before. He didn’t want Dean to be hurt. He wanted to be able to touch his brother again, like all the times he’d get piggie back rides or Dean would twine their legs together at night, but it felt like something else, something too warm and too heavy in his stomach and he couldn’t understand it. 

“I could kiss it and make it better......”

Sam started sitting up and scooting a little, fully intent on doing something to make Dean smile, to get him to make any face other than the one he had now, which Sam could see this close was all just lines he shouldn’t have pulling in tight while he tried to stay quiet. Dean grabbed him though, maybe Dean didn’t like his suggestion, maybe he wasn’t a stupid kid anymore like Sam and it wouldn’t work, he was too tough for that, he didn’t need it. Sam fell on his brother’s chest when he was pulled down instead of pushed away, strong arms circling around his slender frame, a kiss press against the top of his head.

“That’s not how it works, I’m supposed to kiss you.”

Sam squirmed and tilted his face up, pecking Dean on the cheek, afraid he had accidentally touched his thigh when his brother started breathing deeper and they stayed like that a minute, hands against his back strong and his brother so warm, face finally softening.

“Thanks Sam, s’better, you should go to sleep now.”

Dean released his hold but Sam just lowered his head to his brother’s chest again, curved out and away from his legs but pressed against his torso. 

“Kay, night Dean.”

He could feel his older brother’s fingers twitching like they were going to push him away again, Sam knew he had meant Sam should go to sleep in his own bed, but he didn’t care. Eventually Dean’s hands closed around his back in between his shoulder blades again and he felt another small kiss on the top of his head. 

 

-

Sam is only fifteen and sometimes he thinks he’s too young to go out hunting with his dad and his brother. He doesn’t really want to and it has nothing to do with age, but at the same time he really does want to because it means he can help Dean. Although, it’s usually Dean who has to help him. Sometimes he just thinks because they’ve been doing this for so long Dad and Dean never stop to question it anymore. But Dad had to have known something else before this, and Dean, well he doesn’t really know what it’s like for Dean. But it’s so damn frustrating that he seems to be the only one to question any of it, to want to sit still and stay somewhere for once, to want to do well in school. It’s frustrating he seems to be the only one to think their weird family unit isn’t normal and that it’s dangerous. Dangerous in ways other than the blatantly obvious physical kind of danger. But he still goes hunting when Dad says it’s an easy enough hunt to give him some good practice.

Well, it was supposed to be an easy hunt, armed to the teeth with silver they had cornered a shapeshifter and Sam was supposed to just hang back and block the entrance while Dad and Dean took it down, but the monster was going after Dean and it had huge fucking claws, why the fuck it would have claws Sam doesn’t know but he’s lurching forward, Dean’s got himself turned around in the tussle and his back is exposed, Dad coming from the opposite direction, but Sam crashes into the monster before it can get to his brother and he tumbles down with a sharp tearing pain in his shoulder and everything happens too fast, he can’t keep track of what’s going on but the heavy weight across his body tenses and slumps forward on him, then Dean is pushing the body aside and it must be dead and someone is shouting at him and his whole arm is wet and hot before he realizes he’s being pulled up and Dad is examining him. Sam mumbles that he’s okay, just a scratch, and Dean is dragging him back to the car where the emergency kit is while Dad takes care of the body.

Dad was just dad, Sam always found it hard to get a read on the man, there may have been something like pride in his eyes but mostly Dad just looked bone tired anymore, like he was stuck in a fog he could never wake up from and the only time his eyes were clear was when he was hunting. Dean though, once the initial concern had dissipated when Sam was patched up and it was only a few stitches that he needed, Dean did seem proud of him; Sam found it odd, but he knew Dean enjoyed hunting and he guessed his brother was happy to have Sam along. 

They were settled back in the motel, it was summer time and school was out, that meant more traveling chasing hunts from town to town. Their dad had split after he deemed Sam was taken care of, or just after he decided Dean would take care of him, it was hard to tell. Sam knew where the man went, he smelled enough like a bar when he came back and yeah Sam knew what liquor and smoke smelled like. He hated it. It wasn’t too bad this night though, cause Dean was babbling on energetically about their hunt and how well Sam did.

Sam had only his boxers on, his shirt discarded while his shoulder was being mended, his dirty pants were tossed aside because they were gross. Dean had shrugged his shirt off too, the ac unit in the motel was broken and it was a thick muggy kind of hot in the southern summer. Sam frowned slightly when a cold bottle was pressed in his hand, just beer though, and he guessed it would be well enough to take his mind off things. Though his brother did a pretty good job of distracting him too.

He wondered if this was all Dean wanted, violence and liquor and the wind whipping through the impala driving from every shitty town they left behind. Sam wanted so much more. Sometimes it scared him how much he wanted things that he shouldn’t have. Like how he missed the way Dean would kiss him when he got hurt as a little kid. Hell, he felt like he was still a little kid sometimes. And he sometimes felt like Dean was more of a father figure to him than his father actually was. That just made the heavy thing that settled under his ribs even stranger and more confusing to Sam. He couldn’t define what Dean was to him. Sitting under the dim lights while the beer smoothed out the jagged edges of adrenaline and pain in his system he could define what he wanted. He figured Dean thought of him as a young innocent brother, but Sam was far from naive and he knew what was twisting inside of him he just wasn’t sure he wanted to let it out.

Then Dean was sitting too close to him, bright white teeth in his easy smile, plump lips wet with beer, hair spiked up with sweat and muscles flexing with his eager motions. It wasn’t fair, how Sam had to go through puberty all awkward growing bones and angular lines while his brother was defined and confident and fucking oblivious. Dean kept babbling on about things Sam didn’t care about until he was squinting and leaning forward and Sam caught the tail end of a question.

“.....sure you’re okay there Sammy?”

Sam tried to snap out of his stupor, he thought too much, it was annoying. “Yeah, sorry, shoulder just hurts.”

“Did the best I could. It’s really not that bad, doubt you’ll have much of a scar there.”

“Yeah, thanks, I just...”

“Just what?”

“It’s nothing.”

Dean must not have liked how he looked at anything but his brother’s ridiculously green open eyes, they way he twitched and hunched, finishing his beer with a long pull.

“Aw, c’mon, you’re getting too old for this. What you want me to give your ouchy a kiss?” Dean laughed, tilting back in his chair, obviously joking but Sam couldn’t laugh with him. “Damn it’s been years since I sung you a song and tucked you in to sleep huh?”

There were times Sam thought Dean missed being able to take care of him like that, with more exposed gentleness, cause little kids were allowed to be like that but grown men weren’t. Well they weren’t really men yet, least Sam didn’t think of himself like that. He felt like he was stuck in a weird limbo, didn’t have what Dean used to be to him, felt like they were supposed to end up somewhere else but all they had was strained emotion masked by sarcasm and goading. Sam was sick of it, sick of wanting, sick of being a goddam teenager and he was only halfway through. Impulsively, he surged forward and took a kiss from Dean, almost pushing his brother back in his chair, just a closed mouth press before Sam stood up abruptly, going to the fridge for another beer. 

“Uuh.....”

“Yeah I know, sorry.” Sam was moping, he was perfectly aware of the fact but that didn’t mean he had to stop. He passed one beer to Dean and sat back in his chair with the other. Why he was even drinking beer when he didn’t like it and he didn’t like what he saw it do his father he didn’t know, maybe it’s just cause Dean was too and cause it did somehow manage to make his shoulder hurt less, or at the least it made him care less. 

Then something warm slid up his leg and settled on him - Dean’s leg, coming up and resting next to one of his, foot propped on the crossbar of the chair and his brother was leaning over him pressing a kiss to the shoulder that was sewn up.

“S’all right. But I’m supposed to kiss you where it hurts. That’s how it works....”

Sam’s hands, no longer small but not quite as large as his brother’s rough calloused ones, were quick to grip on Dean’s hips, pulling him down and it wasn’t too hard to get his brother in his lap since he was only standing on one leg. Sam was already almost as tall as his brother, almost, but no where near as muscular. His body was stretched out thin, hard and lithe but slender, with Dean sitting in his lap he only came up to about the chin, having to lean back and look up, both of them stuck frigid for a moment looking at each other. 

“What if I want you to kiss me somewhere else?”

“Yeah? Where else?”

Sam tilted his head up farther in response, both hands still gripped on Dean’s skin, smooth and hot under him, waiting. He didn’t have to wait long, Dean pressing down against him, barely connected at the lips and hovering on the precipice of something large and unnamable and absolutely terrifying, but Sam knew he was going to jump, he felt like he always knew he would he just didn’t know when. Pushing his tongue out against his brother’s lips that parted for him, he tasted the bitter of beer and felt quiet heat before Dean was pushing back, gentle like he always was with Sam but there was something quivering like unspoken promises and Sam had no idea what it was but he wanted it.

It felt like the ghost of wet dreams he never really remembered and Sam briefly wonders if the shapeshifter hurt him more than he thought and he was knocked out on painkillers. Because he can understand his idolization of his older brother who has always been there for him and with him, but he has no idea why Dean would want to kiss a scrawny kid like him. He can’t really be bothered to think much longer on it though when there’s hands tripping up his sides and circling round his back to press the curve of his spine and he realizes not only is his painfully stiff erection tenting out from his boxers but his hand has slipped into his brother’s lap where there’s a hard line under the denim and he doesn’t even fumble when he pops the button and pulls Dean’s cock out.

Sam’s afraid if he stops they’ll never start again, if he says anything his brother will have a moment to think and will pull away, so he just keeps kissing Dean and palming him until his brother shifts and he feels the elastic band of his boxers pulled down; shifting on the chair to let it slip under his ass, squirming desperately rutting up into Dean’s hand once it’s wrapped around him, Sam doesn’t stop through the panting and erratic slide of skin until he feels something hot and wet on his chest and all his muscles go taut as his body arches up and he comes on his brother.

Dean’s head drops lightly to his injured shoulder, small kisses placed around the edge of the wound, Sam’s hands wrapped up around his brother and he can feel the way Dean shivers at his touch. 

“Feel better baby brother?”

It’s one of those achingly clear moments Sam knows something has changed, and he never wants it to go back. “Yeah, thanks De.”


	2. Bramble Briars

\- 

Four years, it had been four years since Sam ran away for college. Sure, he could tell himself that as soon as he turned eighteen he was legally an adult and it was normal for eighteen year olds to go to college. He still felt like he was running away. It might not have been fair to Dean, and he was pretty certain his brother didn't discern Sam running away from Dad and how Sam was definitely not running away from Dean, but he had to get out. What wasn't fair in the slightest was that Dean not once attempted to contact him or visit him. Actually, scratch that, Dean was emotionally constipated and it was perfectly normal for him to stay distant. But when Dean came dragging him away from the life he'd painstakingly built for himself over four years to find their father who had been missing for days - Sam was gone four years and not a fucking word, Dad goes missing for a few days and Dean thinks it's important enough to drag him back kicking and screaming - that was not fucking fair. 

Sam would resent his brother more for the blind loyalty and unwavering faith in their father if he wasn't so tired. And not physically tired, it might be funny how his body remembered the best positions to sleep in the Impala despite being longer and broader now, but it was actually kind of depressing. His mind was just fogged, as many times as Dean repeated it wasn't his fault, it kind of was, Jess didn't deserve what happened to her, even if Sam didn't cause the fire he was what attracted the monster that did it, he was guilty by association because it was after Sam and it was probably by extension after everything he loved.

Sam dreamed about her a lot, there were some nice dreams of her sweet smile and the way she'd curl her body around Sam in the quiet content moments, but most of the dreams turned fast and ended in fire, he'd wake up choking on non existent smoke. Dean would press a glass of water into his hand and go back to sleep, he never complained.

Sam still held stubbornly to a bitter sense of anger towards Dean - sometimes he felt it wasn't his fault so much as Dean's, that maybe his brother lead whatever it was back to him when he came to drag Sam to that hunt, but he didn't want to think like that - until he saw Dean one day, coming out of the motel bathroom shirtless and Sam noticed the evidence of four years time written on his brother's torso with new scars. Sam knew all the familiar ones, the ones Dean came home with when Sam was too young to go out, the one's Dean had gotten on hunts they did together, Sam knew the stories behind those but there were new ones, jagged lines, a patch of faint pink from a burn, a half crescent of puncture wounds. All the scars, all the marks and things he knew of Dean's body, all the hardness of their lives that was etched into his brother's skin that he wished he could kiss away, it changed, new stories that don't involve Sam, wounds he wasn't there to tend to.That was when Sam realized there were so many things that could have happened and Dean would have never come back to him at all.

It's a little easier to settle back into it after a few months, Sam may not of ever wanted to stay in this kind of life, passing through towns like disposable napkins and getting more new scars for himself, but there's one constant that warms him and that's Dean. He forgot how good it felt to save people too, even if they didn't always get a thanks, the pride in his brother's eyes was enough. He knew Dean had more love for the open road, but Sam was relearning the beauty of endless horizons and new possibilities, without the blanketing pressure of their father’s presence the world looked different through the Impala’s windows. Farm fields stretching out over gently rolling land, cows and horses scattered between fences, small towns with little main streets and hand painted signs, Sam remembered how he would make up stories about these people’s lives when he was young and how happy they must be. But he saw more than that now, when they rolled through cities collapsing with whole sections of abandoned industrial sections, through suburbs where the rows of identical houses could hypnotize you. Sam found himself enjoying the stretch of endless roads with his brother again but everything was as different as it was the same and it was like he had to relearn what he used to know. 

They settled down for a night after research in a decent motel that at least had good water pressure; Dean drank a few beers before flopping into bed in his boxers while Sam stayed up to read more, flipping through their Dad's journal looking for clues that to be honest he didn't really want to find. When his eyes started burning from staying up too late Sam finally went to bed in a loose tee and boxers, Dean's steady breathing next to him interrupted by the whir of cars outside. It didn't seem like any time passed at all from when he closed to his eyes to when he felt himself being shaken awake from a vicious nightmare. There was tacky sweat on his face when he raised a shaky hand to it and his heart was beating too fast. The look on Dean's face as he leaned over with a hand still half outstretched radiated concern.

"Had a bad one?"

Sam ran his hands over his eyes and sat up hunched over his lap. "Yeah."

The bed dipped and he swayed towards his brother's body, Dean sitting with one leg folded up on the bed and the other hanging over, his posturing saying 'do you want to talk about it', without his lips actually saying 'do you want to talk about it' because Dean never would. 

Sometimes Sam wanted to talk about it, he wanted to tell Dean about how great Jess was, about how he actually enjoyed college, enjoyed the challenge and the routine, hell Sam even went to a few keg parties his friends dragged him to, he knew Dean would approve of that. But he didn't want to talk about it. Because it was a part of his life that had nothing to do with Dean or Dad or hunting or any of those things that were all that Dean knew. He knew his brother scorned his desire for a normal life, Sam didn't really take it personally, mostly he felt that Dean didn't like it because Dean knew he would never fit into 'normal'. So Sam didn't want to talk about that, but he didn't want to go back to bed when Dean was sitting in front of him, face softer with lingering sleep and the world was dark with night, it was peaceful even in a roadside motel.

Sam leaned forward and traced a finger over the crescent curve of puncture marks on Dean's shoulder, he could guess what had created that, but he wanted to talk and to hear Dean's stories and to fill the gaps of the missing years with the life he was going to settle back into. "What's this from?"

Dean pulled his other leg up onto the bed, facing Sam more, a grin lighting up his face. "Oh that one, there was this crazy pair of vamps in Minnesota , fuck knows what they were doing in the middle of no where......"

Sam felt himself relaxing again as he listened to his brother's story, Dean regaling him enthusiastically and Sam was certain there were embellishments in there but it made a small smile tug at his lips. He found himself leaning back and laying down as he listened. When Dean was done with his vampire story, Sam traced another new scar and was told another story, then another. By the third story Dean was stretched out on the bed leaning against the headrest. By the fifth story Sam was splayed across the bed with one leg hanging off and his head tucked on his brother's lap. When he nodded off at the sixth story he barely felt Dean scoot lower on the bed and curl up next to him.

-

Dean was starting to get comfortable again, well as comfortable as he could be given his line of work and the nasty demon they were hunting. Sam was smiling more, joking more, shoving back at him and playing like they used to. Even though dad was still flying solo most of the time, it was a better rhythm than Dean had in a while. He didn’t want to think too close about how easy it was to slip back in step with Sam, didn’t want to think too hard about why his brother left, think about all Sam had lost with Jess, about how his brother was so different sometimes he seemed like a stranger while at the same time Dean could see the concerned ten year old kid that kissed his bruises after a bad hunt. He didn’t know where he stood with Sam anymore but he had a mission to latch his focus on and with the distraction of finding Dad he didn’t have to think about it too hard. 

Then shit just had to hit the fan, then flew through and hit another. Dean could, and would, deal with his father’s death, even though the circumstances were fucking strange and he wasn’t sure what entirely had gone down and the fact that Sam was holding back on that pissed him off, he could deal and he could get over it eventually. But his dad had actually fucking told him that there was a very real possibility he would have to kill Sam some day because for some reason his brother was supposedly going to go all dark side on them, no, fuck that, not happening. That was not the parting instructions he wanted to honor from his father. 

He was pissed, he was way beyond pissed, and Sam had the gall to get his stupid ass drunk and manipulate Dean into promising he would go through with it when it was time – then actually remember it when he was sober – both of the people he actually cared about telling him he’d have to man up and kill his brother some day, Dean wasn’t going to do it. He knew he couldn’t. 

It was strained and awkward between them a lot of the time. Sam was just starting to heal from the wounds left behind after Jess and now he was tossed into this, although Dean knew he probably couldn’t manage to give much a shit over their father dying other than the perfunctory duty of a son, but he knew Sam and he knew this crap with the demon and his destiny and all that shit he couldn’t believe in, he knew it was eating away at Sam. Maybe Dean was using Sam as a distraction now, because he didn’t want to think about himself or have to deal with his own problems. Sam was more important and he was something Dean could work on. 

He tried to cheer Sam up, tried to push him into girl’s arms and get him laid and let him blow off some steam and feel normal, nothing like a good romp to boost your ego and push everything back for a few moments and you can just breathe. But Sam was never interested. A lot of times Dean figured it was cause he really wasn’t over Jess yet, but a small little dirty part of him buried deep inside just wanted it to be because of the way Sam would look at him sometimes, usually when his brother thought he wasn’t looking, would look at him and even though he’d changed so much since he was eighteen Dean could swear he recognized that look in his eyes that was so focused.

It was hard, failing at being a good son, trying to be a good brother.

It was his fault that one night, he knew – of course it was usually his fault – but he drank more than he should, he watched his brother more than he should, he laughed harder than he should because he didn’t know what else to do and it was all wrong. He couldn’t stop thinking about Sam, not like he had anyone else in his life that wasn’t another face passing by, and damn but did Sam grow up. It was something he tried to avoid thinking about the past year since he picked his brother up at Stanford, but Sam grew up, and up, face still soft and young but he was tall and broad and muscled, he wasn’t a little kid anymore, though he was still Dean’s younger brother and that should turn him off but it really didn’t.

Sure they’d messed around a little before, they’d always been really close as kids, when they started growing into their bodies and swimming in hormones it got all kinds of weird, but Dean told himself they never had sex – cause handjobs don’t count. He couldn’t really take it that far though, when Sam still had puppy fat in his cheeks and his limbs were knobby at the joints and his chest was flat like everything else. He had pecs now, muscles, lithe and lean and whipchord thin but when Sam moved around you could see them, curves and bulges of muscles over the angular planes of his body, so much more than the flatness of pubescence, and god but Dean couldn’t take his eyes off Sam tonight. 

Maybe it was too much whiskey and everything else he had been sucking down he couldn’t remember at this point, but the world was humming a bit and he kept spacing out, snapping back to reality when Sam’s sharp eyes were focused on him. Fuck it was just past midnight at this shit hole of a bar Dean had dragged them to and he was already pitifully drunk. He should object when Sam’s big hands pulled him up, grip strong on his shoulder, when Sam turned him around and shoved him out and into the Impala, he should object cause Dean had plenty of control, he was fine, it wasn’t that late, but he didn’t really want to object to anything when Sam touched him. 

Dean stumbled out of the car, getting halfway to the motel door before the world tipped and he felt Sam’s arm around him again leading him forward. He wasn’t black out drunk, he could tell that much, just a little uncoordinated, but while Sam was locking the door behind them he managed to lurch forward and catch a hip on the small table, reeling sideways to avoid that he knocked his knee on the bedpost in just wrong spot, falling forward onto it with a slurred ‘son of a bitch’, rolling onto his back and pulling his knee up to his chest. 

Sam just looked at him like he was pitiful, which yeah he kind of was, but it wasn’t just his knee that had him getting a little glassy eyed, all the stupid reasons he wanted to drink still crashing around in his head, and he had to take a few deep breaths to steady himself, but apparently Sam wasn’t going to let him off easy. 

Rolling into the dip where Sam sat on the bed next to him, Dean found himself bumping up against his brother, and his hands started clenching into Sam’s shirt without him meaning to. “Sammy, why’d you leave me Sammy.....”

His brother’s voice was pinched and tight, “I didn’t leave you Dean. I had to get away from Dad, you know that, it wasn’t about you.”

“Dad’s not here anymore and I, I can’t do it without you, you can’t leave me again, you can’t, s’not gonna happen, I can’t-“

“Dean.” 

Looking up at the sharpness in that, a command in his name, he responded well to commands.

“Listen, I’m not going anywhere, I promise I’ll do everything I can to defeat this, okay, you’ll be fine, it’ll be fine.”

Broad warm hands settled on him, one curling over his side the other behind his head, fingers curling through his hair and it really was kind of soothing, course he’d probably swat his brother away for being such a sap if he was sober, hell he was being a sap, it legitimately frightened him sometimes how much he needed his brother. Summoning what reserves of coordination he might have left, Dean hauled himself up with hands on that big sasquatch frame and pushed Sam down, tackling him onto the bed and laying over him, needing the reassurance of his presence, wanting his attention.

Sam fell with a huff but scooted up on the bed, hands going to Dean’s hips and helping steady his brother, straddled over his lap, and he really shouldn’t be letting Dean get this close, shouldn’t be getting hard in his pants, when Dean was drunk out of his mind and more vulnerable than Sam had seen him in ages, but it turned out that just made him want it more, to hear that Dean needed him. His brothers hands were rough as they pushed under his shirt, lips wet and sloppy where they mouthed at his neck. Sam was buzzed a little from the bar, not enough he couldn’t drive, but if he could count himself as drunk then it wasn’t so bad was it. He’d always wanted more from Dean, he wanted everything.

Pushing Dean’s flannel overshirt off, pulling his black tee up over his head with a small amount of difficulty as his drunk brother didn’t want to take his mouth off Sam’s neck, Dean eventually got with the program and sat up to shrug his shirts off, pulling at Sam’s, tugging him up to take them off and pushing him back down, falling sprawled over him skin to skin, and Sam could feel how fast Dean’s heart was beating and how ragged his breath was, ribs expanding and muscles tensing against him. Sam circled his arms around and fanned his fingers out over the protrusion of shoulder blades, curling over shoulders and dipping down to trace the curve of the spine, fingers pushing under the waist of jeans to skim over Dean’s hips and the swell of his backside. 

It was familiar and different, tempered by age and experience while heated by high running emotions and stress, Dean’s body was almost just as he had remembered it except for the smattering of new scars, but Sam’s body had changed so much since they did this last, limbs longer and denser, he fit around his brother’s body in new ways. 

Dean was the first to go for the belts, holding himself up on one hand to the side of Sam’s head, fingers tangled up in long hair, his other hand fumbling with belt buckles and buttons, he’d done this drunk more than enough time to be swift even if a little messy, pushing denim over the jut of Sam’s hips, grinding his cock down against his brother’s while squirming and wriggling out of pants. Sam helped, he was such a good brother, warm palms pushing over exposed skin, hands gripping Dean’s ass and guiding him into a rhythm. Before Dean could get too distracted he grabbed a condom and one of those little single use packs of lube out of his pocket – he was always prepared whether hunting for monsters or a good lay – dropping the items on the bed next to them befor pants were shucked over the side of the bed.

Sam saw what he pulled out, looked at the two items, looked at Dean, looked back at them, his hazel eyes big and Dean would think they were fucking innocent but he knew better, but Sam just liked to make a big deal out of these sorts of things, Dean figured he’d want to talk about it, want reassurances, want to define it, and Dean couldn’t do that so he bent over and trapped Sam’s lips with his, pushing his tongue past and twisting into Sam’s mouth, fervent and fevered and so fucking needy but he didn’t care right, he couldn’t.

Dean pulled back first, chest heaving and cock twitching, rolling his hips down while he took a moment to remember what balance was, grabbing up the lube and almost tearing the pack in half instead of just taking the tab off the top, slicking his fingers, and Sam just watched him, hands rubbing up his thighs, closing one around his cock, fidgeting and uncertain. Dean was certain though, what he wanted, what he’d wanted for years, widening his legs where he kneeled over his brother and twisting his torso to reach behind himself, opening himself up fast with two fingers while Sam jerked him off, free hand gliding up and down his side. 

When Dean couldn’t take it anymore, what he wanted right in front of him, patient, Sam just laying with his hair splayed out around his head and his eyes transfixed on Dean and his hands fucking everywhere, Dean rolled the condom over Sam’s cock and scooted forward unsteadily to line himself up, Sam’s hands coming to his thighs to guide him, lowering down on his lap and falling forward to curl on his chest, Dean’s hands gripping onto his shoulders, rocking his hips back and forth with small motions while he adjusted breath caught somewhere in the middle of his throat and a tense line between his shoulders until Sam soothed his hand up Dean’s back, murmuring something in his ear he couldn’t make out, lips against the curve of his ear and breath hot over skin slick with sweat. 

Sam gasped and arched up when Dean took him in, he always thought Dean would fuck him, his brother always took control, taught him new things, lead point, but then Dean was stretching himself on his own fingers and sinking down, tight and hot and Sam felt like nothing would ever be as right as this, as dirty as it still made him feel, he was safe in Dean’s arms, it was comfortable and easy, too easy. Running his hands in circles up Dean’s back, he dug his heels into the mattress and thrust up to meet the small pushes of Dean’s hips, pressing their bodies flush together, his brother’s cock a hard line between their bodies, barely moving but he didn’t want to let go or give any room, he just wanted to stay sunk deep and clinging to the only person that really knew who he was. 

It didn’t last long, years of frustration and desperate need dissolving in sweat and come, grinding together insistently and holding on tight, Dean stifling his moaning in the crook of Sam’s neck and Sam whispering things he’d never say in the light of day into Dean’s short hair, both staying pressed together even when their cocks softened and their breathing slowed to steady, but eventually Sam rolled Dean over and curled against him, pulling up the corner of blankets, refusing to part even though they were sticky and dirty, just too bone weary and aching behind his ribs he needed to keep Dean with him and didn’t know if his brother would be there when he woke up. 

-

His brother made a deal with a demon for Sam, traded his own life for Sam, and it’s pretty ironic because Sam was supposed to be the one to die. He wasn’t smart enough or clever enough to find a way to save Dean from that, the last year they shared a painful tension between them like fabric stretched until it just ripped and frayed and he couldn’t line the edges up anymore, Dean drifted away from him before he even made it to hell.

Sam didn’t know how to deal with that, and he kept looking, even after the hounds took his brother Sam tried so goddam hard he took what little help he could find, what little comfort, and maybe if he wasn’t so lost drifting without his brother he’d of been able to see straight but it turns out he didn’t know how to cope, and Ruby slipped in with the alcohol and violence and she just fit there. 

Then Dean comes back from hell. All the stories Sam could trace on his body are gone. Except for the hand print on his shoulder. It reminds Sam he couldn't save Dean, he never made it, wasn't strong enough, wasn't good enough. It's funny, Sam was always the one hopeful enough to believe in angels, but here he is now corrupted with demon's blood and Dean has the mark of a celestial creature on his shoulder and it's the only scar he has anymore. 

His brother makes jokes about being ‘re-hymenated’ body and Sam just rolls his eyes, he’s not taking the bait on that one, he can’t, he feels even more tainted and corrupt by what he’s done with Ruby then he ever did with what he committed with his own brother, but he can’t stop. He doesn’t want to, it’s power and it’s control and Sam just knows he can use it for good. Dean doesn’t believe that though, he catches the side glances, the narrowed eyes, the way Dean tries to keep track of him. But there’s something in his brother’s eyes he doesn’t recognize anymore, a hardness, and he won’t talk about it, refuses to even acknowledge it, keeps saying he doesn’t remember and it’s bullshit.

They just lie to each other, Dean lies about hell, Sam lies about Ruby, and when he sees Dean without a shirt, smooth planes and lightly freckled skin, it’s missing that crescent shaped mark of punctures, missing the thick line across the thigh, it’s missing so much of their history and Sam doesn’t know how to bridge that gap. 

-

Dean thinks he might just punch every guy named Chuck that he ever meets for the rest of his life. Bad harlequin novels with airbrushed covers and creepy conventions with look alikes aside, it only partially raises his hackles that this shit even exists in the first place. And if 'fans' of Chuck's godawful writing want to come to their own conclusions about just what kind of brotherly or not so brotherly relationship Dean and Sam have, that's weird but again only part of the problem.

What really fucking irritates Dean from what he's seen is how people seem to go about indulging in this 'fantasy' world with such glee and eager interest. He could only stomach so much of what Sam showed him from internet research. If those people had to actually live his life for a few days they'd run screaming for the hills. It wasn't fun. It wasn't exciting. It wasn't 'romantic'. It was all pain and blood and desperation and it was never enough. 

Dean knew how to deal with ghosts, shapeshifters, vampires, werewolves, witches, all manner of creepy crawly bumps in the night - hell he was even getting a good hold on demons - but fucking angels and prophets and this apocalyptic destiny crap was just bullshit. It made him nervous that so much of their lives was down on paper, out in circulation, being dissected and discussed. For his whole life, he'd lived in the shadows and covered his tracks, become someone else with an alias and a fake ID, he was trained and he was damn good at disappearing, blending in, being what he needed to be and when. These stories stripped him of that, laid his life open, for anyone - or anything - that could figure out two plus two, they had a whole history of information about Sam and Dean that could be used against them, knowledge really was power, and that made Dean feel exposed. That made him fucking angry. 

So if he was a little more pissy than usual, if he was a little twitchy in the way he stepped around his brother and maintained a distance that usually wasn't between them, it was understandable, cause he was spooked. And if Sam got his sad little puppy dog eyes and wanted to blame it on himself, think Dean was disgusted with them or what people thought of them, that was fine. Because immaturity be damned, Dean was still fucking pissed about Ruby. It took him months to be able to look Sam in the eye for more than a few seconds , even longer to fall back into a hand on the shoulder looking over at his research or fingers brushing passing weapons back and forth. Dean still thought about her taking his brother away and corrupting him and twisting him. But if he thought long and hard enough about it, he knew it was in Sam all along and Ruby just slipped in when Dean wasn't able to keep an eye on him, even without her Dean knew Sam still struggled with it.

All stilted semi connected whatever they were that was starting to heal over just a little bit, it all came screeching to a rusted whining stop again. Because of some creepy books that made Dean want to crawl out of his skin. Because he was being treated like a puppet and he refused to play along. Because sometimes he didn't recognize Sam anymore. And worse, a lot of the times he couldn't barely recognize himself. He let it all drown in cheap whiskey until the world went soft and he could just forget.

He didn’t feel like he could trust Sam anymore, a chasm opened between them in the chase to stop the apocalypse and they fall apart, years of everything they were sloughing away like a slow eroding mudslide.


	3. Brother have we strayed from each other?

-

Dean was right about Ruby. He was right, and he was fucking pissed off at his brother, but he was pissed at himself too, because he didn’t stop it, he didn’t manage to drag Sam away and in the end it’s on both their shoulders when Lucifer’s free but Dean’s only going to yell and shout about Sam because he can’t face what a failure he is. They were supposed to be fighting the good fight, saving people, and in the end they sprung the devil free. It kept coming up that it was Sam in the end, it was Sam that broke the last seal to let him out, but Dean remembers that he was the one to break the first seal when he stepped off the rack in hell. It’s on both of them. What a fine fucking pair of hunters they make.

They separate for a few months but they come back together like there’s only so much lead on the string that binds them together. Dean wants it to be like how it always had been, casual contact, easy smiles, light hearted pranks, but they’re on the road to the goddam apocalypse and all they seem to be good at is getting dicked around by angels trying to use them like puppets and the only company Dean wants at night is whiskey.

He still lets his brother into his bed. He might curl up on his side and give Sam his back, but he doesn’t push Sam away. He might not turn over and run his fingers through that stupid long hair when he hears quiet sobs, but he doesn’t pull away when strong arms circle his waist and press him close. They’re so fucking far away from where they used to be and Dean can’t even think about it much less talk about it, but when it’s dark and quiet and his brother crawls under the sheets Dean lets him. 

-

When Dean gets dragged away from Lisa he can’t help the incessant thrumming in his head that rings like warning bells telling him wrong, wrong, wrong, something’s wrong with Sam. He thinks it, but of course Sam’s been in hell a year so how could there not be something wrong. He’s just so glad to have his brother back, even if it’s an echo of his brother, even if there are jagged edges. Sam still has his dimpled smile and his too long limbs and his way of pulling Dean in like a gravitation.

Then he finds out Sam hasn’t actually been in hell a year, he’s been fighting with the Campbell’s and in all that time they haven’t figured out who actually sprung Sam out of the box. So now he knows that something is fucking wrong with Sam, deep down wrong, no going back wrong.

Dean gets pulled back in, goes hunting with his brother, tries to pretend like the good ol’ days and if he could fake it hard enough to make it he would. Sam doesn’t crawl under the sheets with him at night, doesn’t hug him with all the warmth and strength he possesses or touch him with gentle concern; the way this Sam touches is wrong, the way this Sam talks is wrong, and Dean barely contains the panic under his skin because he hates not knowing what’s going on when it’s so fucking monumental and close to home. 

Sam doesn’t come to his bed anymore and some night’s Dean stays up trying to figure his brother out but he never sees Sam sleep, and try as hard as he might to stay up until he does see his brother tank out, it’s Dean that goes down first. And when Cas shoves his hand in Sam’s abdominal cavity cause they learn Sam hasn’t slept a goddam wink since he came back from hell, Dean doesn’t even know how to process when Cas says Sam’s got no soul. Everything about his brother’s behavior clicks into place and Dean doesn’t know if he can fail his brother again. 

They play along with Crowley, they cajole Death, the stakes are higher but the game is essentially the same and the Winchester’s know how to play. Sam gets his soul back and for the briefest flash of brilliant delusion Dean thinks it’s going to be ok. 

-

Cas broke Sam’s wall. That wall in his head that was holding Lucifer and the Cage back, and probably all sorts of nasty shit Dean did not ever want to think about. Yeah, that wall. It was broken. Sam would space out, stare off into nothing, Dean once caught him sneaking out under the power of an hallucination and shooting his gun into an empty warehouse. Well the warehouse wasn’t entirely empty, Dean was in it, and Sam was still yelling at him like he didn’t exist. No amount of alcohol was going to drown that out. Dean knew Sam wasn’t sleeping much, if at all, he knew his brother was barely hanging on, but he didn’t have a damn clue what he could do for Sam. It wasn’t a physical wound he could stitch up or bind. 

Dean woke up one night from his own lingering nightmares, they were staying at a relatively nice motel this time at least, thick curtains drawn so barely a sliver of street lamp light made it’s way inside. But he had good night vision and he saw Sam’s form sitting upright in bed. He called Sam’s name out first so he wouldn’t surprise his brother and flicked on one of the night lamps. Sam just looked at him with wide eyes, clutching at his hand that he would dig his thumb into, but the scar was healing over and probably didn’t give as much of a kick as it used to. The panic filled eyes that darted around were definitely not good. 

Dean made his way over, sitting on the edge of Sam’s bed, reaching out for his hand and squeezing against the scar there too. “Hey Sammy, you manage to get any sleep tonight?”

“...Dean?”

He sounded confused and far away. Dean sighed heavily, moving farther up on the bed and shifting his grip up Sam’s arm. Finding the pressure point midway up his forearm in the meaty tender part he dug his thumb in hard, grip iron tight around Sam so he couldn’t pull away from it. Sam flinched and blinked but he seemed a little more present. 

“Shit, Dean, what?”

“Hey, hey Sam, do you remember where you are?”

At least Sam looked at him them, full on, eyes clearer and fixed on his face, his brother looked so goddam tired and run ragged. 

“Um, not really.... I’m sorry.”

“Got nothin to be sorry for.”

Sam’s face started to crumple, his arm still caught in Dean’s hand with the sharp throb of pain at the pressure point pulsing up into his shoulder but it was a good anchor for him to focus on, ground himself. His brow was drawn in and wrinkled, eyes starting to water, heaving in a few deep breaths.

“I don’t know what to do........”

“S’all right Sammy, I got you, I always got you.”

Dean hated seeing his brother like this, hated all the things that broke him open and scrubbed him raw, hated being unable to patch him up and put a smile back on his face. He hated himself for not being able to figure it out. Kneeling and crawling up, slinging one leg over one of Sam’s thighs, half in his lap, keeping his hold hard, he let his other hand come up to rest at the nape of Sam’s neck, fingers pushing through thick hair.

Sam leaned forward and latched on to him, his free arm circling around Dean’s waist and grabbing the thin fabric of a tee shirt, lips pressing forward barely trembling with a held back sob because he could still see things over Dean’s shoulder, flickering and fleeting as they may be with the sharp point of pain Dean gave him to focus on, there was a smile in the corner of his sight and a snicker in his head that just wouldn’t go away. 

Dean’s hand at the back of Sam’s neck curled over the skin, fingers digging in there too and pinching the sensitive spot as Sam gasped and shivered under him, the slack jawed kiss turning into something with more focus as Sam kissed him with open pleading eyes and soft lips, whimpering against him, too undone and worn down to care if he was letting himself be vulnerable, to care if he was asking and needing and wanting instead of being the strong hunter he was supposed to be. 

Dean kept pushing him, kept asking, kept looking for pressure points to burn down into Sam’s skin and pull him back out of his own mind into the physical world. His brother sprawled beneath him, welcomed it, writhed under strong fingers on sensitive nerves. 

Shirts off, skin flush and hot against each other, Sam tipped back against the bed and Dean straddled his waist fully, the older brother running his hands all over the other’s chest and arms, pushing here and there, digging in with harsh pressure and leaving a scattering of bruises. Skin flushed and sickly pale he could tell Sam was loosing weight, couldn’t even take care of himself and Dean was trying his hardest to keep it together and take care of both of them, he couldn’t lose any more pieces.

Desperate and wild eyed, going against his every instinct to lay hands on his brother in a harmful way, trying to bring him back, Dean would leave as many new scars on Sam as he needed if he could get his Sam back. Sam’s mind. That was Sam. Sam’s soul. His body, this body, wasn’t even the one Dean would patch up and tuck into bed when they were little. This body was undone, killed, burned in hell, it was remade and rebuilt. He couldn’t trace the scars he’d known like photos in a photo book. 

The only thing that seemed to bring Sam back was pain, and Dean could give him that, he could bring Sam back and he could leave his mark like a claim on his brother to retell their story, write it down fresh, what they are, what they are together. Maybe Dean’s a little off kilter too, he never wants to hurt Sam, but there’s never really a clear choice between blacks and whites anymore and he’s starting to see too many greys. He thinks that a few scars will be easier to see than the blank look in Sam’s eyes, or even worse, the panic. 

So he gets a knife from his duffel bag, his brother’s arms reaching after him, and he settles between Sam’s thighs. He leaves a ladder of bright red down Sam’s ribs, and his brother bites off his scream, holds still, pulls Dean closer when the knifes set aside and there’s so many things in Sam’s eyes he can’t look at them all. But there’s more clarity there, focus sharp from adrenaline, and Sam wraps his legs tighter, pushes his cheek against the side of Dean’s face where he’s buried against Sam’s neck, whispers ‘thank you, thank you’. 

 

-

Sam dropped everything when Dean came back, from purgatory of all places. He would have never made that guess in a million years, but he still felt stupid for not having thought of it. He dropped everything he had painstakingly made for himself in a year, dropped a woman he was starting to learn to love and a dog that brought him back from the brink, gave him something to care for, something to be there for. He dropped their home, he dropped it all for Dean, to get back to him. But apparently it wasn't good enough still, and every time Dean glared daggers his way, with slanted eyes and a hard line for a mouth, it twisted deep and spiteful in Sam.

There was something vicious in Dean. It was more than all the rough edges, the hardness, the wariness, the hunter that Sam had known his whole life. It was something new. Dean was even more terse and reserved, he didn't flirt in diners for bigger portions or with people they interviewed to get more secrets. He didn't step close to Sam and bump their hips together or brush hands when they walked. Sam didn't like it, but he didn't know what to do about it, he'd say he wanted the old Dean back but which Dean was that - when he was a teenager and still had some small amount of joy in his eyes, that Dean was so far removed from him Sam couldn't tell up from down sometimes, did he want Dean when he was fresh out of hell, or when Sam didn't have a soul and it didn't hurt to look at his brother, or when he was sharing headspace with Lucifer and nothing mattered. He didn't know what he wanted anymore, so he sulked and tried to get Dean to open up again. 

Like everything else in their lives, they usually took turns with drinking too, when Dean got raucously drunk Sam would hold back with a couple beers and let his brother drink himself to death - which he stopped complaining about because death kind of lost it's meaning a few lives ago. And when Sam really need to get sloshed, rare but every now and then he did, then Dean would hold back, like they were taking shifts, keeping watch. But right now they were both drunk, and it was dangerous.

As soon as Dean hit the bottle, Sam refused to stay sober with him, he'd had enough of watching his brother who was not quite his brother so he poured himself a glass too. That earned a look from Dean, lips downturned and eyes displeased, but they were locked up in a motel room and their hunt was over so really there was nothing to keep watch over but each other.

Unfortunately, drinking made Sam more talkative than usual. Seated in a rickety motel chair in front of Dean passing liquor back and forth with his long legs sprawled out and just ready to get tangled in Dean's, Sam nudged at his brother's leg.

“Dean, why don't you ever let me get close anymore?"

Dean tipped back a shots worth and blinked at Sam. "Yeah we're not having this conversation right now."

"Yes we are, or we're never going to have it, you've been pissy with me since you got back, and I don't think I deserve to be punished like this."

"Oh you're the one being punished? Poor Sammy, his big brother doesn't want to talk about barely hacking his way out of purgatory for a friggin year."

"That's not what I mean and you know it Dean. God, what are you even blaming me for?"

“What am I...?!" Dean's face was shocked and angry, sitting up ramrod straight in his chair."You fucking left me there for a year! You didn't look for me, you didn't even try, you just what, you went off and found yourself a girl and replaced me, you just dropped off the face of the earth! I'm the one with every right to be pissed at you!" 

Sam slammed a fist hard down on the table rattling the glasses. "Dammit Dean you can't keep playing that card! I was alone, I had no idea where you were, I had no clue where to even start, I had nothing!"

Dean shot to his feet, towering over Sam. "Don't even start with that, we've gotten bigger and badder things done with less intel when we were just going on determination and stubborn jackassery, and you didn't even look!"

Sam rose to the challenge, stepping up to Dean and looming over him. "If you don't recall the last time I tried to save your ass when you went awol I drove myself off a cliff and you weren't too happy about who I had managed to find help with that time, you bitched about when I tried to find you before and you're bitching about it now that I didn't. And you know what, you took time off too when I went to hell, you don't get to be all high and mighty here Dean!"

Dean didn't answer with more shouting, he threw a punch, hard and square on Sam's jaw sending him reeling back and to the side, stumbling against another chair before righting himself, swaying drunkenly with disbelief on his face.

"I don't think you want to continue this conversation Sam."

There was that something new and vicious in Dean, standing with his legs slightly apart planted firm, knees loose and arms half raised, he was ready for a serious fight, not a tussle, not a wrestling match, Dean wanted Sam's blood. And Sam just wanted break that hard new veneer Dean had.

"I dropped everything the moment you showed up Dean, everything, just to come back to you."

That wasn't the conversation Dean wanted, with words, Sam knew it, and he was ready, slightly unsteady from alcohol but years of training and the sharp sour rush of adrenaline had his feet planted when Dean lunged at him. He twisted to throw Dean when their bodies collided, and Dean wrapped around him, pulling him down. If they were sober they probably would have staid upright, but between blinks Sam’s head was cracking against the floor and Dean was trying to restrain his arms.

Sam dug his heels in to the floor and snapped his hips up and aside hard, rolling with Dean as they knocked against furniture, setting a dresser wobbling, breaking the leg on a chair. There was too much pain between them, too much mistrust and betrayal, but etched deeper than recent transgressions was the absolute and unyielding love they held for each other. It wouldn’t have hurt as much without that. 

They threw punches and they broke skin, bleeding against one another, they bled into each other and all the festering years of lies and miles of separation seeped through the wounds. Sam didn’t want to see his brother like this, didn’t want to do this. Because they were supposed to be refuge and retreat for each other against the world and it hasn’t been that way in too long. He wants to remember what it is to kiss his brother with affection and care, to touch him with gentle hands instead of curled fists. 

-

Dean had to do it, he has no apologies for his actions, there was no way he was going to let Sam go down. He said he would protect his brother, he told Sam to stop, told Sam it would all be okay. Told Sam they could just back out of it. Should of fucking known better Winchester. But he would make it all right, however he could, in any capacity he could, because Sam was not going down for it, not when Dean promised him that he’d be all right.

He can’t stop seeing the pain in Sam’s eyes, can’t stop hearing him ask who Dean’ll trust over him next, he still relives it, Sam’s eyes red rimmed bleeding out his arm skin slick with perspiration and a crack in his voice. Dean’s brother. Sammy. He wouldn’t fail to protect him one more time, and if that meant getting him help any way Dean could possibly do then dammit there was no question. 

It was a desperate bid, asking the angel’s for help, but Dean refused to let Sam go down. Dean might have thought a little more about it, if he had the time, if it wasn’t the only goddam card left in his hand. So yeah, he tricked his brother, deceived him, let an angel use Dean’s face to get into Sammy’s head and his soul, to get him to say yes. It was the only option Dean had, cause letting Sam die was not an option.

At first it was easy enough to convince himself that he’d done the right thing. He could tell them apart, Ezekial would talk to him and give him status reports, the angel was there to look after Sam when Dean couldn’t, heal him in ways Dean couldn’t. And Dean believed him. It was easy to, when he wanted to so hard. But that didn’t last. Cause the pieces didn’t line up right and there was no mistaking that Sam’s sickness wasn’t getting better. 

Dean feels exhausted from being so wary and on edge around his brother, and the angel inside him. This bone deep full body ache exhaustion isn’t a new concept to Dean though. He sleeps fitfully if at all, spending too much time staying up late and drinking, locked inside his own head. Yet, when Sam comes to his room, they curl under the bed sheets together, and they let each other touch even though they don’t talk about it anymore, don’t talk about much at all anymore. It’s all kinds of wrong to Dean, because he doesn’t know if the angel is watching, or hell if the angel might even be controlling, and he likes to think he can still tell his Sam apart from Ezekial but there’s so many things Dean doesn’t know anymore. 

But Sam is a warm comforting weight, and he smells like Sam always smells, and he sounds like Sam always sounds so Dean lets himself believe this one small thing. Because he’s weak, and he’s selfish, and he knows that he’s nothing without his brother. This brokenness between them, it’s nothing he can kiss and make better, it’s not a scar that will fade with time.

Turns out Ezekial isn’t even the guys name, and Dean knew angels could lie, knew they were really proficient at it actually, but he let himself be tricked so he’s got no one to blame but himself. There’s not even anyone left to punish him but himself. 

-

There’s another scar on Dean’s arm. Sam only saw it once, his brother keeps it covered under layers, even keeps that arm away from Sam, tries not to brush against him or get too close. 

There’s a new scar on Dean’s arm, his eyes are hard and cold, and it scares Sam knowing what his brother is capable of. Sam doubts they’re both coming out of the other end of this alive, business as usual really. 

What’s not usual is that it’s got him thinking he might have to be the one to stop his brother now. Ironic, isn’t it, when Sam was the one corrupted with demonic blood and even their own father had ordered Dean to keep an eye on him, kill him if it went too far. Now Sam’s not too sure what’ll happen if Dean goes too far, he’s not too sure if he’ll even be able to stop him.

There’s a new scar on Dean’s arm and there’s nothing Sam can do it about it, he doesn’t want to hear the story of how Dean got it, he doesn’t want to kiss it – if they ever even touched more than just passing weapon’s back and forth anymore – and he can’t stop thinking about it. Sam did his research, he wanted desperately to be able to burn or flay the scar off and get rid of the damn ‘Mark of Cain’ bullshit, but there’s no ritual or magic knife that would remove the mark from under his skin, from in his soul. 

Sam tries hard not to think about the future, he doesn’t think there is one, not for him and Dean together, they strayed too far from each other and got lost. There’s no breadcrumb trail back to his brother’s side, back to his heart. All they have are scars they don’t show each other anymore, and kisses wilting ungiven behind sealed lips.


End file.
